As a former over the road truck driver, I hauled anything and everything you could imagine. The one constant was JIT inventory, just in time. That's been the new way of doing business for most companies for many years. The theory of tying up your assets in inventory has been replaced by JIT. So, when stores don't have any back inventory what happens? The distribution centers can't get inventory to the stores quickly enough as they are almost always waiting for the next truck to show up, JIT. I've seen weather and traffic delays shut down various assembly lines because there was no inventory to keep it going. I've sat and waited out hurricanes and major snow storms to bring items to those distribution centers that were completely empty. Many paper manufactures have loaded trailers full of inventory just sitting waiting to be delivered. Most plants don't shut down they just keep pumping out their products but many items just sit in trailers waiting to be delivered.